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Editorial: City grant reforms welcome

 
Published May 26, 2017

The St. Petersburg City Council made sensible changes to how tax-funded grants will be awarded in the city's high-poverty neighborhoods, a needed improvement after last year's process drew charges of unfairness and political favoritism.

In 2016, the city handed out more than $300,000 in grants in the South St. Petersburg Community Redevelopment Area. Funded by property tax money generated by rising values within the CRA, the grants are meant to help businesses, developers and homeowners improve their properties and collectively help pull the area out of poverty. But that goal faltered badly when the checks were cut. More than a third of the grants went to businesses in the booming, largely gentrified neighborhoods of Historic Kenwood and Grand Central. The smallest grant drew the biggest outcry when the Pinellas County Democratic Party was awarded $531 for landscaping at its headquarters on First Avenue N. (The party ultimately declined the money.) The grants were awarded by city staff and Mayor Rick Kriseman's office, which made for terrible optics.

So bringing more transparency and fairness to the grant process was essential. Under a resolution approved by the City Council, a committee composed of the three council members whose districts are in the CRA and four citizens advisory committee members will review grant applications and recommend awards, which would need final approval from the council. The city also created specific criteria for evaluating applications. They include extra credit for building along blighted corridors, rehabilitating vacant structures, bringing in new commercial activity and creating jobs.

The reforms are a big step forward, and the city is doing considerable outreach to make sure people in struggling areas like Childs Park and Midtown know that funding is available. However, the jury is still out on whether pots of cash being awarded to certain property owners over others is the best way to fight poverty.